June 12, 2014 | Written by: Matthew La Rocque, Research Analyst, The Institute for College Access & Success

California college students who meet Cal Grant eligibility requirements are guaranteed a Cal Grant if they’re recent high school graduates who meet the application deadline. But students who apply for a grant more than one year after finishing high school or who miss the application deadline face a starkly different reality. Just 22,500 Cal Grants for these students – called “competitive” Cal Grants – are authorized each year. And for 2013-14, there were 16 eligible applicants for every authorized award.

In other words, an eligible applicant’s chance of receiving a competitive Cal Grant is about 6 percent. Wondering how that stacks up against other notoriously long odds? We did some digging and found that it’s tougher for an eligible student to earn a competitive Cal Grant than:

• for a gamber to win in a Las Vegas casino (13 percent);1 or
• for a high school senior who applies to Ivy League colleges to actually get into one (9 percent);2 or
• for a college baseball player to get drafted by a Major League team (9 percent).3

Getting financial aid shouldn’t be harder than beating the odds in Vegas, getting into the Ivy League, or making the majors. The hundreds of thousands of eligible students denied Cal Grants have an average family income below $21,000 for a family size of three, and an average GPA of 3.0. The odds confronting these students are far too long, and the losers far too deserving, for policymakers to continue accepting the status quo. Parallel efforts are underway in the California State Assembly, via this year’s budget negotiations and Assembly Bill 1976 (Quirk-Silva), to increase the number of competitive grants available and ensure that all authorized grants are actually getting to students. Putting our money on high-achieving, low-income students isn’t just a safe bet – it’s the right bet for California.

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1 Across all games and tables in the Clark County Downtown Las Vegas area, the average win percentage is about 12.8 percent. For slot machines, the average win percentage is about 6.7 percent. State of Nevada. State Gaming Control Board. Gaming Revenue Report. December 31, 2012.http://gaming.nv.gov/modules/showdocument.aspx?documentid=7618.

2 Among applicants for the Class of 2018, the aggregate admissions rate across the eight Ivy League colleges was about 8.9 percent. Washington Post. March 28, 2014.http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/the-ivy-league-admission-rate-8-point-something-something-percent/2014/03/28/558400de-b67e-11e3-8cc3-d4bf596577eb_story.html.

3 About 9.4 percent of NCAA senior male baseball players will get drafted by a Major League Baseball (MLB) team. NCAA Research. Estimated Probability of Competing in Athletics Beyond the High School Interscholastic Level. 2013. http://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Probability-of-going-pro-methodology_Update2013.pdf.

About the Author:

Matthew La Rocque is a Research Analyst for The Institute for College Access & Success.

Click here to read his bio.